Thursday, October 9, 2014

Children of fathers in
healthcare and finance have greater risk of having offspring with ASD while children
of parents with technical occupations exhibit greater ASD severity, according
to researchers at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston
(UTHealth). The findings were presented at the International
Meeting for Autism Research (IMFAR) in Atlanta and appear in the peer
reviewed journal, Research in
Autism Spectrum Disorders.

Autism spectrum disorder
(ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by impairments in (a)
social communication and (b) restricted and/or repetitive behaviors or
interests that varies in severity of symptoms, age of onset, and association
with other disorders. According to recent estimates, approximately 1 in 68
children in the United States has an ASD diagnosis. In addition, a recent study
of parent reports suggests that prevalence of ASD in the US could be as high as
1 in 50. Despite this growing literature
on prevalence and incidence of ASD, less is known about the etiology of this complex
neurodevelopmental disorder.

It has been suggested that
parents of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) may present with less
recognizable autistic-like phenotypic characteristics or traits (broader ASD
phenotype), leading them to highly systemizing occupations such as science,
engineering, mathematics, computer science, accounting, and medicine. Others
have suggested that many professionals with highly systemizing occupations are
functioning with undiagnosed ASD. Using secondary analysis of data from two
previous studies of children with ASD, the researchers tested associations
between parental occupations and ASD diagnosis and the association of parental
occupational characteristics on ASD severity. Children for both studies
were recruited from the same educational, clinical, and community sources.
Suspected ASD cases were determined by clinical interview and
observation. Those meeting DSM-IV-TR criteria were administered both the
Autism Diagnostic Interview, Revised (ADI-R) and Autism Diagnostic Observation
Schedule (ADOS) to confirm diagnosis. Parental occupations were established
through demographic questionnaires during assessment. The researchers used the
Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) system to classify occupational
characteristics of interest. Parents were divided into those who had more
non-people-oriented jobs (technical) or more people-oriented jobs
(non-technical). For example, those
working in engineering, scientific research, and accounting were considered
having technical, white-collar occupations while those in healthcare
professions were consider having non-technical, white-collar positions. Statistical
analyses were used to explore associations of ASD status with certain
white-collar occupations and occupational characteristics and to investigate
differences in mean ADOS and ADI-R domain and total scores for parental
occupation characteristics.

The results indicated that
for paternal occupations, fathers who worked in engineering were two times as
likely to have a child with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) as compared to
all other white-collar occupations. Additionally, fathers of ASD cases were
seven times more likely to work in healthcare occupations and five times more
likely to work in accounting/financial analysis. There was no association with
a mother's occupation. However, children who had both parents in technical
fields were associated with significant social impairment and
a higher risk of having more severe overall autistic symptomatology.

The findings suggest that
there is a joint association between parental occupation and ASD severity, as
well as a relationship between paternal occupation and ASD diagnosis. These
results are also supportive of a “broader ASD phenotype” in parents of children
with ASD which includes individuals with mild impairments in social and
communication skills that are similar to those shown by individuals with ASD,
but exhibited to a lesser degree. The tendency of people with autistic-like
characteristics to marry (assortative mating) might contribute to
intergenerational transmission and having offspring with greater ASD severity. "Parental
occupation could be indicative of autistic-like behaviors and preferences and
serve as another factor in a clinician's diagnosis of a child with suspected
autism. Medical students can be taught that this is one of the things to
consider," said. Aisha S. Dickerson, first author of the study. More
analysis should be done to determine what factors contribute to occupation
choices, and how these factors, if identifiable, can add to the risk of
communication or social impairment in the offspring of these individuals.

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